One-Third Of Americans Changed Their Sports Viewing Habits Because Of Social Justice And Political Messaging

sports ratings social justice political messaging

Getty Image


As social justice protests took place all over the United States in an already intense political climate, most athletes and leagues implemented a progressive strategy to deliver messages about social and political topics. With these athletes and leagues pushing political and social opinions, a large number of sports fans started tuning into games far less often.

According to 1,601 U.S. Adults that took part in a new YouGov/Yahoo News poll, 34.5%, over one-third of those polled, said they are watching less due to social justice and political messaging. The majority, 56.3%, said they watch the same amount of sports while around 11% said they now watch more sports as a result of social justice messaging.

It’s no secret that the 2020 Presidential Election caused sports ratings as a whole to drop last year, but based on this poll, it’s abundantly clear that politics and social justice messaging played a role in the decline as well.

When it comes to political party affiliation, 53% of Republicans said they watched less sports in 2020 due to social justice messaging, while only 19% of Democrats watched less. Independents were a bit more split, with 38.6% saying they watched less and 8.7% saying they tuned in more.

For the second straight year, FOX took the crown as the most-watched network of live sporting events with 238.7 billion minutes watched in 2020. CBS was second on the list with 160.7 minutes and ESPN was a close third with 160.4 billion minutes watched.

News was by far the most-watched genre of TV as it accounted for 20% of all national TV viewing in 2020.